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Every doctor carries along her/his own little graveyard. Inevitably, we make mistakes. People die, or become disabled. You never forget those patients. 1/n
In my first year of training there was a 20yo woman with stage IV lymphoma (DLBCL). She was clinically fine but I overlooked her creatinin which showed severe CKD from diuretics. 1w later she came in with heart block from betablocker overdose and died. 2/n
An older woman during training was admitted after a fall. She complained of shoulder pain -> no fracture. Next day she was paraplegic from spinal fracture. She hadn& #39;t complained about her back and I missed that. 3/n
More recently as an on-call consultant, a patient became blind from giant cell arteritis. Point is, we learn from our mistakes, but the consequences are severe. You never forget them though. A little graveyard with all the lost lives, limbs and abilities, you carry around. 4/n
You remember them when you are on holidays with your family. Or another quiet time. We have to cope with that and give it a place in our heart. Or else we become #secondvictims, get burn out and can& #39;t help others anymore. We don& #39;t talk about this enough. 5/n
Occasionally you can diagnose or treat patients no other doctor was able to help. Those victories are however forgotten after some time. They never compensate. But remember, you can& #39;t save lives without losing some. 6/n
Sounds familiar to you? We can talk about it. It happens to any doctor with time.
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#MedTwitter
@mancunianmedic @Trisha_the_doc @jfdwolff @WikiDocJames @InvictaOrtho @mmse30 @FrailtyMD @GeriMedMD @macesari @dr_shibley @drphiliplee1 @drjohnmorley
